Fiber-to-the-Home (FTTH) is one of the hottest new markets in optical networking. Utilities, cable providers, telephone companies, and other communication based entities are starting to connect homes and businesses to the Internet through fiber as opposed to coaxial cable or telephone wire. Fiber permits data transmission bandwidths of one Gigabit/second and higher. Therefore, with fiber these entities will be able to provide high bandwidth data services, such as video on demand, and voice services to the homes of subscribers.
These entities currently are building and retrofitting circuits to be used at subscriber homes that will convert the data traffic from an optical signal to an electrical signal. In addition, these entities are also adding a secondary power source, which in most instances is a battery backup, to the home systems to keep the home gateway open in the case of a power failure of a primary power source. This addition of a battery backup is significant. For example, in the case of an emergency where a primary power source fails, a subscriber may still use selective network resources powered by the battery backup to contact emergency services.